Epidemics threaten China as floodwaters spread

Epidemics threaten China as floodwaters spread

BEIJING (AFP): China's Health Minister Zhang Wenkang warned of
epidemics as raging floodwaters from the northeastern Nenjiang
river wiped out the third line of dikes protecting the country's
most important oilfield, state media reported yesterday.

Zhang said widespread flooding across huge areas of central
China's Yangtze river basin and in the far northeast this summer
threatened a mass outbreak of the water-borne snail fever, or
schistosomiasis.

The threat of all kinds of epidemics in the wake of the flood
disaster, which has already affected one-fifth of China's
population, will worsen in the next three months, he was quoted
by the official Xinhua news agency as saying.

About 400 cases of the debilitating parasitic disease had been
reported in Inner Mongolia as well as in Hubei, Hunan, Jiangxi,
Heilongjiang, Anhui, Jiangsu and Jilin provinces, the minister
said.

But experts fear many more may already be infected as snail
fever has a symptomless latent period of 40 days.

River snails carry the parasite, which enters the body through
the skin of people standing or swimming in water. Untold millions
of troops and civilians who have been wading while helping to
sandbag dikes and carry out rescue work are at risk.

Schistosomiasis, also known as bilharzia, kills some 200,000
people worldwide each year. It gradually worsens over years if
untreated, causing urinary bleeding and eventual kidney failure.

Insanitary conditions, exposure and a shortage of medicine
among millions of flood evacuees had mainly caused dysentery,
hepatitis and colds, the minister said.

The official media admitted earlier this month, however, that
cases of deadly typhoid and cholera had already appeared in the
northeast.

The official People's Daily reported that uncontrollable
torrents from the Nenjiang river late on Friday ruptured the
third set of emergency embankments thrown up in a desperate
attempt to save the giant Daqing oilfield and its nearby city.

Some 700 oil wells were in danger following the disaster and
tens of thousands of People's Liberation Army troops were rushing
to erect a fourth line of defense 20 kilometers back -- this time
within the limits of Daqing city itself, newspaper reports said.
Daqing alone accounted for one-half of China's onshore oil
production last year.

Some 1,443 wells were already inundated by rising waters, and
state television earlier reported that daily production had
fallen by 11,000 tons per day, or about 6 percent.

At least 2,000 people have been killed in this year's
flooding, according to the most recent government toll released
on Aug.6.

Record-high waters on the northeastern Songhua river meanwhile
kept Harbin city's nine million residents on top alert yesterday
and showed no signs of relenting.

The People's Daily said a "serious" leak appeared at a dike in
the city center on Saturday but was brought under control by 1,
000 troops who rushed in for emergency repairs. More than one
million army personnel and civilians continued to reinforce dikes
already stacked high with sandbags, it said.